The topic speaks of a problem that each of Habravchan can unexpectedly encounter: “how is it possible to deliver your cargo from point A to point B with the least expenditure of effort, time and money?” ...

... and about the service that helps solve this problem ...

... and most importantly,

How to "get into the bull's eye" by creating a new service.





The service, which will be discussed, I liked the "accurate hit." Exactly what a customer like me needs. Actually, such accuracy prompted the writing of this topic, in which I tried to identify the specific issues that need to be addressed before starting to create a service in order to ensure that this service meets the expectations of users. Such a preliminary analysis is often forgotten, being fascinated by the problems of usability, design, promotion, monetization and other “tasty” tasks. As a result, the excellent work of designers, programmers and other project participants may not be in demand by customers, and the result does not meet expectations. And it is not so offensive if the investor loses the money - this is his pay for the lack of qualifications and arrogance. It is a shame when the work of a team “on the enthusiasm” in which there was no even an “intuitive” (without special education) marketer, comes to nothing. This topic is addressed to them as information for consideration.

To solve a problem, you must at least know it.

It will be about the company whose blog has recently appeared on Habrahabr - about Perevesi.rf . This is an online exchange (network service), where carriers and customers meet who wish to transport any cargo. No matter where and where: from address to address, from one city to another city or even another country.

Service exists relatively recently, but, according to the founders, has already received its audience and is growing steadily. What is done to make the service successful?

According to my ideas, from the very beginning, the authors carried out an in-depth analysis of the market and competitive environment and on this basis, a clear positioning was carried out: what clients the service is designed for and what needs of these clients it should meet.

Let's try to repeat this path and start with the competition.

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Competitive environment or

Everything is relative

In order to assess the level of competition in the transportation market, let's compare the traffic exchange with the traditional freelancing exchange we know. And the first thing we find that competition in the mutual search for customers and performers in the field of transportation is no less than in IT, PR and Web services, that is, in traditional freelancing. But it is qualitatively different.

(Note: the comparative method of analyzing the competitive environment is rarely used, but in this case it is clearer, and freelancing is well known to Habravchanam)

To understand what differences we are talking about, let's compare:

Traditional freelance is focused mainly on the market of Web, PR and IT services, relatively young (just exchanged second ten) and has not lost flexibility. Here, the contractors - both customers and performers live and work in the network (in real life, they only have beer and some household trifles). They easily change their preferences (usual for the best or just new). For the most part, traditional freelancing is a completely modern exchange market, where performers are looking for orders publicly exposed by buyers on numerous exchanges, and are competing for these orders (even large studios that have their own websites do not stop at this). This, incidentally, leads to lower prices, which pleases customers and is not too happy freelancers.

On the contrary, the transportation market “remembers mammoths”, is rigidly structured, has long been divided between numerous carriers, and customers, as a rule, are rather inert and use the usual (they only look for the new when they “press”). In addition, not all customers are “on you” with the Internet and prefer to use offline contacts, for example, control room telephones. That is, not only is the competition for the online transportation service that we are interested in very tough, but it is not always direct either (we have to compete with many local telephone dispatchers).

We now turn to the analysis of the market.

Transportation market

A significant part of transactions in the transportation market, especially regular and / or large-tonnage, takes place outside the network and in money terms these transactions occupy the lion’s share of the market. Alas, this part of the market is practically unavailable for network service (at least for now).

In the network, there are two common variants of mutual search for counterparties:





Customers "hang out" their order on the "bulletin board" and wait for proposals from carriers by phone or email, while spending a lot of time on negotiations.





Transport and logistics companies offer their services on their own sites, and customers, as far as possible, are looking for such sites with suitable services and conditions.



Having passed such "procedures", customers, especially when it comes to one-time and relatively small orders, rarely change the choice once made - they just feel sorry for the time spent searching. Therefore, in the transportation market, a start-up (a new network service), in order to achieve success, among other things, must overcome the inertia of the market and fierce competition from carriers that have long since settled in the market.

To overcome or (which is better) to circumvent these obstacles, it is necessary to clearly understand the problems of the market, choose your niche and offer the best solution to the problems typical of this niche. That is, in the language of marketers, first you need to choose the market segment where the service will be in demand.

Niche selection

It is obvious that the segment of large-capacity and regular shipments (coal, timber, fertilizers, metals, etc.) is practically unavailable for a simple network startup. As already mentioned, the majority of transactions in this segment are carried out outside the network, and if in the network, then through the websites of major carrier companies. Some more of such deals are announced through “notice boards”, in particular, through public procurement sites and tender sections on the sites of major customer companies. In addition, it is necessary to take into account that in this segment the role of non-market factors is great: lobbying, corruption and primitive “protection” by the authorities, security agencies and frank organized criminal groups. To count on the success of the network service in such conditions is simply naive.

Medium-sized enterprise customers get out of the situation, having a staff of logistics professionals. Such specialists are engaged in organizing transportation professionally (that is, they receive salaries for the time spent searching for a carrier and do not consider this time to be lost), besides they have established options, connections, contacts and do not really need new services.

The problem of attracting orders in medium-sized enterprises-carriers is also mainly solved by staff managers.

There are no special problems with private regular (albeit relatively inexpensive) transportation. Every citizen usually knows the phone of his taxi, the supplier of water, food, alcohol, finally. You can always find a taxi or order delivery from furniture and building materials stores. Small businesses that need to regularly deliver raw materials or ship finished products usually have a “long-playing” contract with their “own” carrier.



What remains? Remains relatively small and therefore the least developed segment - the segment of irregular traffic. Here the customer is experiencing the greatest difficulties. Usually it is a person or a small company. When there is a need for transportation, a newspaper with the necessary announcements or a friend who knows the coveted telephone number is usually not at hand, unfortunately. Placing your ad on the "public" network board next to orders costing several hundred thousand rubles does not make much sense - they simply won't pay attention to it. And to search for a suitable carrier in the network, as already mentioned, is quite laborious. On the other hand, many small carriers suffer from incomplete loading, but they cannot learn about potential customers of one-time services.



Thus, having considered the transportation market, we found that in the segment of irregular transportation, the problem of mutual search for counterparties is quite acute, and it can in principle be solved by a network service.

Now, according to science:

Choose target customers

Actually, target customers have already been selected. On the one hand, these are customers of irregular transportation - people and small enterprises. On the other hand, they are carriers that need to be fully uniformly loaded - transport companies and private carriers.

Next step:

Examine the problems of target customers

For customers, the problem lies in the complexity and laboriousness of finding the optimal transportation option, especially in “exotic” cases, when, for example, you need to move from town to town or transport a piano. The second problem, which is characteristic first of all for small towns, is monopoly high prices. For example, shipping from Novouralsk to Ekaterinburg (70 km) costs the same, and even more than from Ekaterinburg to Moscow (2000 km). For example, the transport company "Rail Continent" asks for the delivery of cargo 150 kg 0.7 m3 from Ekaterinburg to Moscow 923.3 rubles, and for taking the cargo from Novouralsk - more than two and a half thousand, and about any additional services like driver assistance when loading speech does not even go.

For carriers, the key to success and at the same time, the main problem is to ensure a complete and as uniform load as possible (minimizing downtime and idle runs). The number of carriers, especially after the onset of the crisis, far exceeds the market demand. The most common means to attract customers - advertising in these conditions leads only to unproductive increase in costs, since competitors respond to each advertising action. (PR-schiki rejoice - carriers are yearning).

Now you need:

Understand what the target customers expect from the service

With minimal effort, customers would like to receive competitive offers from carriers, and in a convenient form that allows them to comprehensively compare offers not only in price, but also in terms of the availability of additional services, quality, reliability, etc.

Carriers need orders with a moderate level of commission, which are paid only for actually received orders. In addition, they are interested in the opportunity to increase their competitiveness not by dumping, but by the nomenclature and quality of their services (for example, through the mechanism of positive feedback). They are interested in the growth of the customer base, and getting high-quality contacts (leads), which they can then convert into their regular customers.



That is, in fact, the entire analysis of the market and competitive environment (an integral part of any business plan). Naturally, it is made in haste and very superficially - without numbers and calculations, only to show the main landmarks. The authors of the service, judging by the result, did it in good faith.



And now we will leave behind other sections of the business plan and see how the Perevesi.rf website meets the listed expectations of the customers of the service - customers and carriers.

Perevesi.rf - realized expectations

Having entered the site, the customer does not look for an artist and does not spend time on calls in order to find out the average cost of services in the market. He simply publishes his order, reviews the offers of carriers who have responded to the order, and selects the most attractive offer in terms of price / quality ratio, reviews, rating and other features. With the help of “Perevesi.rf”, customers of services have the opportunity to quickly and easily find a contractor who is ready to transport almost any cargo to any region at the best price, and if necessary to get all related services - pick them up from the warehouse, assemble, move, disassemble and assemble , pack-unpack.

This unique opportunity is provided by a large number of carrier carriers competing for customers who have become "residents" of the site.

The benefit of the carriers is also obvious: first of all, they receive the desired orders and at the same time do not spend money on advertising, the effectiveness of which is problematic, and pay only for real orders received. In order to increase their competitiveness, performers “pump over” their accounts, collect positive reviews, expand the range of services, reduce prices.

The attractiveness of the exchange for carriers is evident from the fact that their number is growing exponentially and now exceeds 30,000 throughout the country and in neighboring countries. It is not surprising that with so many performers half of the applications receive at least five sentences, another 20% receive at least three sentences.

How it works

I will not waste your time on the description of work with the site. Anyone who needs to find a carrier will do it without any problems. I, at least, did not need any hints - everything is clear at a glance.

The components of success, they are also “growth hormones” and development

In addition to accurate positioning, the project’s success, of course, was played by the thoughtful and attractive design of the site and its functionality.

But I would like to highlight two more fundamental points that determine the success of the service:

1) Strict observance of the balance of interests

Relationships between customers and performers are built according to the market principle: performers offer - customers choose, and the administration creates favorable conditions for this process, without putting any restrictions, unless it protects customers from rudeness, as is done, for example, by moderators Habrahabra.

The administration and the owners of the site are not allowed to go all serious, in order to extract the maximum profit in the shortest possible time. They do not interfere in the mutual settlements of customers and performers - there are no enslaving “risk-free transactions,” as on some very well-known freelancing sites. Commissions charged from the performers range from 5 to 9%, depending on the size of the executed transaction. For comparison, the rates of other transport control rooms start from 10% and usually amount to 15-20%. Registration of artists on the exchange, access to customer requests and issuing offers is free of charge.

That is, both customers, carriers, and site administration / owners are satisfied, and a three-sided balance of interests is maintained.

2) Monitoring the needs of exchange participants and the continuous improvement of the site according to their proposals.

To make sure, just look at the page where the participants publish their wishes, and the administration announces innovations.

Conclusion

I hope that the discussion in the topic will help developers, especially young ones, not to forget that in order to successfully achieve the goal this goal must be carefully chosen and clearly presented. And I ask the professionals to excuse the arbitrary (in some places even frivolous) use of the terms and postulates of Marketing.